Telling the Truth for Women

Jill Briscoe: As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. That was the verse that both of us came to individually about a couple of months before we met each other. Both of us made that personal commitment to this: as for me, and if ever I should marry, my house, we will serve the Lord. It was a wonderful surprise when we did actually meet and were able to share the fact that we had come to that verse together and shared our commitment to it. I want to take this verse and look at the context, and I want to talk very seriously to you about what it really means to be partners together and to be able to say, "As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord."

Let's look at the context. We start in Joshua 24:15, which was the text, but let me tell you what was happening. Joshua was 110 years of age. He was that old. At 110 years of age, just before he died, his work was finished. He had spent the last 50 years leading Israel into the Promised Land, vanquishing the enemies of God, dividing up the land, and assigning it to the tribes of Israel, the families of Israel. In fact, there had been a little period before this speech where peace and prosperity, for the very first time in most people's lives in Israel, pertained.

During that little piece of peace and prosperity, something interesting happened. The gods that their forefathers had served the other side of the river, those gods began appearing in tent after tent after tent and took their place on the god shelf in the families that represented Israel of that time. Now it's time for Joshua to die, and he has one great last sermon, one great last word for the people of Israel. He'd been a great leader. It says in the Bible that under Joshua, during his lifetime, the people had served the Lord. Now he begins to see them reneging on that initial promise that they'd made.

He gathers them together and says to them, "Long ago, your forefathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the river and worshipped other gods. But," says the Lord, "I took your father Abraham from the land beyond the river and I led him throughout Canaan and I gave him many descendants." Then he says, "I gave you land on which you didn't toil and cities which you didn't build. You live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you didn't plant. Now, fear the Lord, serve him with faithfulness, and throw away the gods your forefathers worshipped beyond the river in Egypt and serve the Lord. But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose today who you're going to serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the river or the gods of the Ammonites in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we're going to serve the Lord. We're going to serve the Lord."

They were beginning to drift away from the commitments and the choices that they'd made. What were those choices? Joshua had been there right at the beginning. He'd been with Moses on the mountain. He'd been there when God with his finger wrote the Ten Commandments. Number one: thou shalt have no other gods before me. Number two: you shall not make any idols or graven images. Joshua, whether he was within sight of that incredible supernatural thing as God with his finger wrote those ten rules for the human race on tablets of stone or not, we know not. But we do know that they came down together.

Moses was carrying the two tablets of stone: five of the Ten Commandments on one, five on the other. As they came down, eager to share what God had laid out on the top of the mountain, they heard sounds of merriment. For the people of Israel had got fed up waiting and they said, "We don't know what's happened to that fellow that brought us out of Egypt. So, Aaron, make us a god. Make us a god like the Ammonites have. Make us a god like the Babylonians have." Aaron, incredibly, said, "Well, give me your jewelry." All the women stripped themselves of their gold and silver, and he threw it in a fire and out came a golden calf.

The people went wild, and they were having a party and bowing down and saying, "This is now our god." Down comes Moses with the Ten Commandments in his hands. Number one: thou shalt have no other gods before me. Number two: you shall make no graven image like unto anything like a calf. Moses lost his legendary temper and broke the Ten Commandments, literally, by throwing them down. You know what happened? God allowed the people to deal with the consequences, and he always does. He gives us freedom. We can worship any golden calf we want, but you cannot choose the consequences of your choices.

The consequences were drastic. Read the story in Exodus. Joshua was there. Joshua was there when Moses, in the wilderness, set up a tent. It was called a Tent of Meeting. Who was meeting? God and Moses, Moses and God. Face to face, it says. Imagine, face to face. Who else was there? Joshua. He would stay outside the tent. Remember who else was present? That cloud descended. That Shekinah glory, that emanation from the visible presence of God, basically. There was Joshua. Can you imagine as Moses met with God and listened to God, and then Moses would come out of the Tent of Meeting and go into the camp and say, "This is what the Lord says."

It says Joshua stayed in the tent. Not surprising. He stayed reveling in the visible manifestation of the presence of God. Joshua was there. Then Moses dies and God says, "Come on, Joshua, take the people into the Promised Land." Over years and years later, God gives them victory, and the Lord of Hosts fights with them. Everybody is there. But here and there, they begin to drift away. It's funny what prosperity does to all of us. Joshua gathers them together for his last message. Guess what it is? "Put away the idols and the gods and choose today who you're going to serve. But as for me and my house, we're going to serve the Lord. So choose."

The people said, "The Lord, he is God. We'll choose God." He tests them and says, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know what's happening in your families. I know what's happening in your marriages. I know what's happening. A god here and a god there. So choose today who you're going to serve." My challenge to you would be to take that challenge to your own hearts. Who are you going to serve? The gods the other side of the river, the gods of the Ammonites, the gods of the Babylonians? You say, "Jill, we don't have gods of Ammonites and Babylonians, do we?" The idols, incidentally, are the same. They just wear new clothes.

Stuart and I took a couple of days to go and explore a part of England that we've never seen and never been in, and that's the part where Stonehenge is, one of the centers of New Age religion in Europe today. Around there, there's all sorts of little shrines. There were some people poking around, and there was this little lean-to with some flowers and things. Obviously, it was a shrine of some sort, and there was a middle-aged couple there. I said to this middle-aged couple, "What's this?" They said, "This is to the moon god." I said, "Really? That was the god of the Ammonites 3,000 years ago, or more. Really? The moon god. Tell me about it."

He told me about it. No difference. The moon god. Paganism rules Europe. You wouldn't know the Church of Jesus Christ for centuries brought Christianity to Europe. You wouldn't know. The gods and the idols and the golden calf are back in Europe, in my country. Paganism, materialism, selfism, sexism, spiritism—it's all there. The idols have just changed their clothes. Joshua gave a ringing statement: "Choose. Choose time. Choose." Number one: the choice was personal. This is where we begin. Let me ask you, kindly and gently, did you ever make that decision? "As for me, I will serve the Lord." Did you ever accept Christ? Did you walk forward at a crusade? Was it your water baptism? Was it your confirmation?

Where were you when, as best you knew how, whether you were brought up as a believer or not, you said, "I want to serve Jesus. I want Christ to come into my heart, to forgive me my sin, and to invade my life"? When was it that you chose to serve the Lord? Because first and foremost, it has to be personal. It has to be personal. The personal choice of serving the Lord will affect every relationship in your life. It will affect your marriage, it will affect your children, it will affect your singleness, it will affect everything. Many of you remember. I remember. Eighteen years of age, lying in a hospital bed, a student at Cambridge, without God, without Christ, without hope.

The girl in the next bed to me said, "Have you ever heard of Jesus?" Well, yeah. So what? The gospel was explained to me. God walked down the stairway of heaven with a baby in his arms, put him in a bale of hay, and set this world on fire. Never heard it, not like that. "Why?" I asked her. "Where was he going?" she said. "When he left heaven, right to your heart." Right to my heart he came. I lay in a bed in Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge all those years ago, and I said, "As for me, I will serve the Lord." Before I made that prayer commitment, she asked me a very important question. "Jill, don't make this commitment unless you're willing to stay unmarried."

"What?" I said. "Don't Christians marry? Am I to become a nun? What's this about?" She said, "Well, it isn't that. It's just that in England at that present time, there were very, very few Christian men." Our churches were full of little old ladies, and they were being sold for stores and shops. That's the state of England when I grew up spiritually. She said, "The Bible says you should not marry somebody that doesn't know the Lord. Did you know that? Young people, did you know that? Be not unequally yoked with an unbeliever, for what fellowship can you possibly have? It's like light and darkness. It will affect everything."

Because the Bible says that, Jill, there aren't any Christian men, very few who love the Lord. So by the law of averages, if you commit yourself to Christ, you're probably going to be single for the rest of your life. Do not become a Christian unless you're ready for that. Would you have become a Christian if somebody had said that to you? Well, it took me about three days to figure it out and to decide. Then as best as I knew my heart, not understanding really what she was talking about, I said, "As for me, I will serve the Lord." I came to Christ honestly believing I would never marry because I certainly wasn't going to marry anyone that didn't love the Lord, loved my Jesus.

So I went into my Christian life, went back to college, and began to teach as a teacher in the back end of Liverpool. I found myself going back on that promise. How could I possibly live singly in a double world? In my day, marriage was sort of like an idol for me. I had a mom and dad who had given me the model of, I think, a perfect marriage. Yes, God wasn't in the equation, but they loved each other deeply, and they loved us. In fact, the family was God. God wasn't god of the family; the family was god. The family was my parents' idol. I am the glad recipient of all that good stuff.

So I thought, "Yes, I said I was willing to stay single, but Lord, just in case, I'll make a list." I made a list. I said, "If anywhere in the world there's someone like this, then I just want you to know." So I put tall, dark, and handsome, marine, play rugby, sporty, loves the Lord, wants to live for Christ and die for Christ. It was all on the list. Then I said, "Would you like to read my list?" He said, "Jill, I can see. Give me the list." "Oh no, just give me the list." "Well, if I give you the list, I'd like to keep reminding you about the list if I give it to you. Give me the list." I don't know how long I knelt there, a long time. In the end, I let the list fall on my bed where I was kneeling into his nail-pierced hands, and it was done.

Freedom! I was free from going there in case I met him. I was free from being obsessed with it, even making ambitions and plans of what I'd do with my life or where I'd teach and all of that. I was free. "As for me, I will serve you whether I ever marry or not. I will serve you whether I stay single all my life in this double world." Could God sustain me in that? Yes. I'm so glad I learned that lesson and had three or four years experiencing that. Because after my marriage, God asked me to stay single though married, as Stuart traveled for up to nine months of the year for ten years. I think I would have taken him out of the ministry if I hadn't learned how to be single and happy.

"As for me," no conditions. "As for me, if you give me a husband. As for me, if this, as for me, if that." No "ifs," no "buts." "As for me, I will serve the Lord." That's a challenge to anybody that isn't married. It's not my challenge; it's God's challenge. The girl that led me to the Lord took me to a passage of scripture in Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 7. I recommend it to you. Paul, in this instance, is writing to the church at Corinth which is in crisis. We don't know what the crisis was, probably persecution from Rome. Probably they were setting up little arenas in Corinth with wild beasts, and anybody that became a Christian in that city was thrown to the beasts for entertainment.

That was probably the crisis Paul talks about, but he says, "Because of the present crisis, I suggest you put your marriages on hold. I suggest you fathers do not give your daughters in marriage for a period of time. I want to spare you seeing them being thrown to the lions, basically. I want to spare you." Then he talks about singleness. He says singleness is good. Singleness is great in this situation. Singleness is a gift. I remember thinking, "I don't need it, thank you. Don't want that gift." But it's a gift because the married person, says Paul in 1 Corinthians 7, the married person has a divided heart. They have the distraction of a husband and children.

The married woman, but those who are single can attend upon the Lord without distraction, without this division, without being pulled in ten different directions. You can revel in God. You can attend upon the Lord without distraction. You can plumb the depths of what it is to suddenly know him, acute awareness in your life deep down in your heart. Joshua says, "As for me." It's where we start. This is a continual choice. The word is in the continuum. I have chosen. I will choose. I did choose. I chose and chose and chose. This is the character of Joshua. Is it your character? Is it mine?

Yes, we can probably all look back to when we said, "I will, I'll be a Christian, I'll do it." But then daily, the dynamics of choice are daily, daily, daily. I will choose, I did choose, I will choose, I will choose tomorrow. I will choose and choose. Here he is at 110, still choosing. You're not going to get away from this, nor am I, until the day we die. There will be a daily choice to serve the Lord, to put him first, to decide: will this decision I'm making, will that decision I'm making be to his and the kingdom's advantage? Am I putting him first before myself? Is the family god? Am I worshipping the family, or is God the god of the family?

"As for me and my house," says Joshua. Household is the word. It's very difficult to take the culture of Joshua's time, or the culture of Paul's time, or the culture of Peter's time and draw parallels for you and me, but there are principles we can take that never die. "As for me and my household, we," first me, then we. What is our Christian family partners together? What's it supposed to look like to the outside world? What are we supposed to be doing, two Christians both of us believers with our children, hopefully believing children, trying to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord? Huge challenges if we really take this seriously.

What if the household contains an unbelieving spouse? The passage that perhaps we need to hang our heart over is in 1 Peter chapter 3. This time it's Peter, not Paul, addressing the marriage and family situation that arose in the early church. Peter writes, and for the first six verses in 1 Peter chapter 3, he deals with the problem of the women who are in a marriage with a Roman or a Jew or a pagan who have come to Christ through the evangelism of the early church and their work. These women find themselves in a situation you and I will never find ourselves in, in our particular society.

For the Roman husband had the right to put his wife to death if he wished, if she dared to balk him as he chose the religion. So if he chose to serve the Roman god, she'd better shape up, or she was not only punished or put in prison, she could be killed. These women have come to Christ, and they're in a situation where maybe they would be allowed to come to the little group of believers. Maybe they snuck around. Maybe they had to come in secret and their husband didn't know. If the man came to Christ, he changed his religion, he had the right, and he brought the whole of his household to church. But if the woman came, she was in trouble.

These women, loving the Lord, having come into life and faith, began to try and give the gospel. It says in 1 Peter 3, he says you've got to win them without words. Now, this is to women. We can't do much without words. What they were doing were preaching at their husband, preaching at their husbands. They so longed for their husbands to come to Christ. Some of you are in that situation. You're the believing spouse and your husband doesn't believe. The temptation is to just bury them under preaching. Years ago, and I don't know how many people Stuart and I have been involved with in marriage counseling, I can't tell you how many.

But I do remember in my Bible study a woman coming to Christ. This is in the 80s, probably beginning of the 80s. She came to me and she said, "We had a pretty good marriage when we were both pagans. Now I've become a Christian, and there are things that he's asked me to do I can't do anymore. There's places he's asked me to go I can't go anymore. Our marriage is in trouble, and I'm trying to explain the gospel to him and it's making it worse and worse. What do I do?" I remember taking her to 1 Peter 3, and I said Peter said you've got to win him without words. She said, "What's all that about?" I said, "Do you think he'd come and see me?"

She asked him and he said, "Yes, I want to see this woman that's ruined my life and my wife." So I remember praying very much, actually fasting and praying, the day before I saw this young man. He comes into my office and he's mad. I mean, he's really angry. She comes in looking pretty scared and apprehensive, and we sit down. I said to the young man, "I really have a lot of sympathy for you because you suddenly find yourself married to a woman you didn't marry." He was quiet a minute and he said, "Yes, you're absolutely right. I am married to a woman I didn't marry. If she had been like this, I wouldn't have married her."

I said to the wife, "You've got to make him glad he married you. You're a new woman, a woman he doesn't know. You've got to love him to death or to life. That's what you've got to do. Peter said love each other deeply, win him without words. Stay there and make him glad you've stayed. Tell him about Christ through your life." Peter says in 1 Peter 3:4, wear the jewelry of Christ's character: the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, of a calm temper, a contented mind, a heart free from passion, pride, envy, and irritability. You know something? I've never heard a man say, "I'm looking for an angry, jealous, never satisfied woman who's full of herself, loud and touchy, selfish, and arrogant."

Have you ever heard anybody say that? Do you know a man that would look for a woman like that? Do you know how many men wish their wives were content? The content of contentment is Christ. Women are not content. Always want more, always want that. But when Christ is in your life, when you've said, "As for me, my relationship with Jesus is number one, is all that matters," out of that flows all my other relationships. You'll be content. In fact, it says in the Bible, "Be content with such things as you have, for he has said, 'I'll never leave you nor forsake you'." If we'd have more contented women, we'd have better marriages.

So it's to your advantage, men, that your woman loves the Lord. For this we need Jesus. But for this we have Jesus if he's come into our life. So then, how do we blend family and serving the Lord when both of us are believers? This is a challenge, huge challenge. Peter addresses it in 1 Peter 3:7: "heirs together of the gracious gift of eternal life." He talks to the men and he says, number one, "be considerate as you live with your wives." Another translation: "figure her out." That's what it means. Know your wife. Figure her out. You've just got to figure us out, guys. That's your life's work.

It's going to take your life's work to figure us out. I know we're a mystery to you. You have to get to know us. Figure us out, and when you have, honor our strengths and help us in our weaknesses. Honor our strengths and help us in our weaknesses, that nothing hinders your prayer. I would say very gently and kindly to you gentlemen, if you don't treat your wife right, don't expect God to hear your prayers. I didn't say that, Peter did. That nothing hinders your prayers. So for Christians in a marriage, Peter attends to the relationship first. He tells us women to be strong and do what's right, not submit to any old thing.

Only what we can submit to in our stand for God. Had a young couple once, a woman of the young couple come to Christ—both of them had come to the Lord, actually, but I don't know where he was. Both students at Marquette, she worked in the office of the university, and he was finishing up a master's. He said to her, "You work in the office. Get me the exam papers so I know the answers and submit to me. You say you're a Christian. Bible says you're to submit to me and do what I tell you in everything. Get me the answers." She said, "No. No, I must obey God rather than man."

So here we have new rules for those who have come together in matrimony: partnership, both individually saying, "My first allegiance is to God and what he tells me to do," and then as partners together. How do we balance it all? Know us, understand us, so nothing will hinder your prayers. There's a cost. There are priorities that need to be looked at. Both Christians, I wrote a book on this, I tried to find a couple in the Bible in ministry. It was hard because, of course, we're starting with the early church. But I found Peter and his wife. Yes, his wife is there. There are four or five references to her.

We know she was there. Starts off in Mark 1 where she's there, and her mother-in-law's sick and Jesus heals her mother-in-law. Her mother-in-law gets up and serves. The whole town gathers at the door. Remember the story? This little Galilean homespun woman couldn't read or write. Finds herself married not to a fisherman who she married, but to the head of the church, right? That was a shock, huge shock. She didn't marry a pastor, a priest, an apostle. She married a fisherman. Suddenly, she finds the whole town gathered at the door and her mother-in-law, who's just been healed, gets up and serves them.

She exercises the gift of hospitality. Do you know what hospitality is? The word means the love of strangers. People think hospitality is having all our friends and neighbors and our church people into our house two or three times. That's not hospitality. Hospitality is saying, "World, welcome. You can come anytime you want, for our family is serving the Lord. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." Oswald Chambers said, "God breaks up the private lives of his saints and makes them a thoroughfare for the world on the one hand and himself on the other." I want to testify that was been the hardest thing for me as an English lady whose home is a castle.

In the whole of my Christian life is realizing that my home was not my home. It's his. I don't have any right just to invite who I want into my home. It's his house. So he can invite who he likes, and he's got some weird friends. He has some really strange friends that he has every right to invite into our house. I remember learning that as we got married, Stuart's still in the bank, I'm still teaching Manchester, little row house. Across the road is the Cat's Whisker coffee bar. Gangs of kids would hang out there, leather jackets, chains on their backs, tough kids.

Stuart would be preaching in the churches which were empty save few little old women. Every weekend, he'd be away for the bank in the week, catching criminals—he was a bank inspector—and then in the weekend, he'd go and preach where he was asked to. I said to him one day, cradling my baby in my arms, "Why don't you do something about those kids instead of rushing around to the three little old ladies? Look at them, they're… you know, why don't you…" And he said, "Why don't you do something? You're here, I'm there." I said, "But I've got my baby."

He said, "As for me and my household, we will serve. Jill, go get them." So I got three little teenagers from our little tiny church, and I trained them to go and reach these kids. Then I said, which was very nice of me, "I'll pray for you." I did. I watched with my baby in my arms. My three little well-trained evangelists went over, there was a fight, they closed the coffee bar. To my horror, I saw them pointing at me over the street. What they did was say, "See that lady watching us? She's invited you all back for a free cup of tea." That was a turning point in both my husband's and my life.

They came. They filled our house. The only place I could stand was in the little tiny hallway with my baby, David, in my arms. Stuart came back at midnight; they were still there. Tried to get in, but he couldn't; it was full. I remember this long-haired kid with hair dyed in all different colored stripes opening the door and saying, "Sorry, mate, there's no room," shutting the door. It was the beginning, partners together. "As for me and my household, we will serve. We will be a serving family." Is there a cost? Of course there's a cost. Anything that's worth something costs something.

What is it costing you to serve the Lord at the moment? As believing couples, as proclaimed Christian families, is it costing you anything? You say, "But what will it cost my children?" I don't know. Don Carson, professor at Trinity, said this: "I look at my children and I wish for them enough opposition to make them strong, enough insults to make them choose, enough hard decisions to make them see that following Jesus brings with it a cost—a cost eminently worth it, but still a cost." But I'm a Christian parent; I'm praying, "Save them, Lord. Protect them, Lord. Bless them, Lord. Kiss every hurt better, Lord."

We should, and we can, and we must. But when you're serving the Lord, it's not always possible to save them every hurt, and it's not always possible to save them the cost. But "as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." One of my kids reminded me the other day, "I remember when Daddy sat us down and said the ethos of this family is serving the Lord, and that carries with it a cost." All our children have obviously remembered because they too have households that serve the Lord. How does it work? Let me come back to the beginning of my talk.

How does it work? In your initial commitment to the Lord, in the nurturing of your interior life, in that being the first responsibility you and I have. "As for me, whether my husband ever finds you or not, I will serve the Lord. Whether my children ever make it or not, I will serve the Lord. I will serve the Lord, on and on and on." How's it going deep down in your life? Are you trying to do all this stuff outside your life, but what's happening inside? Have you collected a few gods along the way? Or is the family god instead of God, the god of the family?

Is yours a serving family? Are you paying the price? It all starts down here, down in your life. Down in my life where it's restless and wild, down in my life where the adult's a child. Down in my fears and worries and cares, suddenly Jesus is there. Touching my heartstrings, he sings me a song, quiets the child till she's steady and strong. Banishes worries, just smiles them away, turning my night into day. Down in my life where the troubles run deep, down in my life when I can't get to sleep. Down in my life when life isn't fair, suddenly Jesus is there.

Rebuking the turmoil, he sends it away, gives peace in the panic and helps me to pray. Turns sorrow to praising, surprises my pain, and bids me to face life again. So down in my life when I'm lonely and old, deep in my heart when my spirit is cold. Down in my life when I don't know what's best, suddenly Jesus gives rest. Gift doesn't age, he remarks with a smile. I'll set your soul dancing and make life worthwhile. I'll guide you in righteousness, wisdom's delight, and nerve your faint heart for the fight.

So he stands in my shadows, and the light on his face reflects all his love and his mercy and grace right down in my life where nobody goes, deep in this heart the Lord knows. Down in my life where it's restless and wild, down in my life where the adults are child. Down in my soul, I'm acutely aware: suddenly Jesus is there. That's where it's at. So it isn't just "suddenly I'm aware," but that becomes a constant moment-by-moment consciousness of the living God in my heart. That's the choice you make.

Maybe what we need to do is choose today, re-choose, re-commit who we're going to serve. Pray with me. Heavenly Father, I thank you for this verse of gold and silver. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. What privilege to know you when I was young. What privilege to know you when I was single. What privilege to make those choices, well-advised by your Holy Spirit. What privilege. I pray for the young people. I pray they would settle for nothing else but total transformation of their lives by Christ by His Spirit.

I pray they would choose right in their friendships. I pray they would choose right in the partner for their lives. I pray they would let you choose, that they give you the list, Lord. I pray for those of us who are single yet, and I pray we would not miss the opportunity to know you down in our lives, to attend upon you without distraction. I pray, dear Lord, until or unless you give us the person you've chosen for us to be married to, I pray we may prepare ourselves by all-out service for you.

Then I pray for the marriages in this church. I pray that the richness and the depth and the incredible privilege of a regenerate marriage and a regenerate family may be explored to your honor and glory. That the world may see serving families with all that that means. I pray for women married to unbelievers and men married to unbelievers. Lord, bless them, answer their prayers. May they so become such an incredible person in Jesus that their spouse is so glad and wants to know the Lord too.

I pray for our children, that they may see parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles who say, "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord," and may it make them hungry for the same. I pray specifically for our missionaries and their families. Lord, as I've been preaching this message, I've thought of this last year and the families we have had the privilege of staying with all over the world, and those precious missionary kids. What they've taught me, and how my heart sings, and how your heart must sing, how you must smile when you see these marvelous kids catching it, wanting it, glad to pay the cost because there's nothing like it. Nothing like being a regenerate family, partners together, serving the Lord.

Maybe some of you need to say something in the quietness to God. I don't know what the Holy Spirit's been saying; I know He's been saying a lot. If you would like to respond to that in the quietness, why don't you talk? Just talk to him right now. Lord, would you hear these prayers and do your work as deep down as you can possibly go in our lives? We give you permission. Hear our prayers and let our cry come unto thee. For Jesus' sake. Amen.